Rep. Paul Broun (R-GA) tore into scientists as tools of the devil in a speech at the Liberty Baptist Church Sportsman’s Banquet last month.

“All that stuff I was taught about evolution and embryology and the Big Bang Theory, all that is lies straight from the pit of Hell,” Broun said. “And it’s lies to try to keep me and all the folks who were taught that from understanding that they need a savior.”

According to Broun, the scientific plot was primarily concerned with hiding the true age of the Earth. Broun serves on the House Science Committee, which came under scrutiny recently after another one of its Republican members, Rep. Todd Akin (R-MO), suggested that victims of “legitimate rape” have unnamed biological defenses against pregnancy.

“You see, there are a lot of scientific data that I’ve found out as a scientist that actually show that this is really a young Earth,” he said. “I don’t believe that the Earth’s but about 9,000 years old. I believe it was created in six days as we know them. That’s what the Bible says.”

Broun — a physician, with an M.D. and a B.S. in chemistry — is generally considered to be among the most conservative members of Congress, if not the most. He drew national attention in 2010 for saying he did not know if President Obama was an American citizen.

He's a populist demagogue, pandering to religious fundamentalists. This kind of crap should have stopped 100 years ago.

To be fair, not all "creationists" believe thing that conflict with science, so you should use more specific terminology. Also, there are plenty of Democrats, including in Congress, whose beliefs are just as much in conflict with science.

I realized that you can be creationist and go with string theory as well, and be satisfied that strings somehow got "created" if you want. There is no way for us to see beyond matter anyway, we may draw conclusions based on pattern recognition and probability and what not, so you might as well build your own opinion that you can live with and don't have to bother anybody else.

That being said, I am utterly convinced that established religions may have some amount of intuition, but to take them at face value and run by its operating system, and believe it that it is the TRUTH, is to miss those miniscule amounts of actual truths (glimpses) about reality (or whatever metaphysical word you use) that you can occasionally get when not trying to fill in the blanks with junk.

I'm happier living without knowing, because of the poetic chance that I might find out one day, then to live according to some dogma where life is about performing certain thought patterns and physical rituals, and suffer from cognitive dissonance every day.

He's a populist demagogue, pandering to religious fundamentalists. This kind of crap should have stopped 100 years ago.

To be fair, not all "creationists" believe thing that conflict with science, so you should use more specific terminology. Also, there are plenty of Democrats, including in Congress, whose beliefs are just as much in conflict with science.

ah, another republican apologist_________________I call for full employment is a call for war!

He's a populist demagogue, pandering to religious fundamentalists. This kind of crap should have stopped 100 years ago.

To be fair, not all "creationists" believe thing that conflict with science, so you should use more specific terminology. Also, there are plenty of Democrats, including in Congress, whose beliefs are just as much in conflict with science.

Creanionists, or believers in the hypothesis (to be polite) of "intelligent design", believe the world was created by a supernatural entity, +/- 6000 years ago over the course of 7 days. So, unless you're using a different definition of creationist, the fundamental belief on which they base everything is in conflict with science. Alse, while it's probably true that there are Democrats that share this view/belief, the ones that like to talk about supporting and believing this nonsense seem to be overwhelmingly Republicans.

He's a populist demagogue, pandering to religious fundamentalists. This kind of crap should have stopped 100 years ago.

To be fair, not all "creationists" believe thing that conflict with science, so you should use more specific terminology. Also, there are plenty of Democrats, including in Congress, whose beliefs are just as much in conflict with science.

Creanionists, or believers in the hypothesis (to be polite) of "intelligent design", believe the world was created by a supernatural entity, +/- 6000 years ago over the course of 7 days. So, unless you're using a different definition of creationist, the fundamental belief on which they base everything is in conflict with science. Alse, while it's probably true that there are Democrats that share this view/belief, the ones that like to talk about supporting and believing this nonsense seem to be overwhelmingly Republicans.

First of all, I'm an atheist. Secondly, yes, I am using a different, accurate definition. You are apparently referring to "young Earth creationists", "Biblical creationists", or "religious fundamentalists". Most people who hold some creationist belief are none of these things, but simply believe things like "the big bang itself may have been an intentional act of some intelligence beyond our current comprehension".

I share Prenj's distaste for the illogical and sometimes socially destructive dogma and mythology of most organized religions. But, the inaccurate generalizations parroted by you and mcgruff are intolerant, anti-spiritual bigotry and blind prejudice, which you have foolishly allowed yourself to be programmed with. Such views are neither rational nor scientific.

Edit: Oh, and when I say "Democrats also have beliefs that conflict with science", no, I'm not saying there are a lot of Creationists there (although I suspect there are -- in the Southern Baptists). What I'm talking about is, as studies have shown that we have discussed in here before, mind-boggling percentages of Democrats who believe in angels, who believe in ghosts, who make use of "psychics", and so on. I was also talking about Democrats in Congress who have talked about the risks of Guam being capsized or asked to visit the space capsule that was used to put men on Mars. Stupidity is not isolated to the Republican Party; there are a whole lot of staggeringly ignorant Democrats.

Last edited by Bones McCracker on Sat Oct 06, 2012 7:31 am; edited 2 times in total

Deists, by definition, are "Creationists". Yet a deist believes the "big bang theory" as much as your nearest atheist does. The difference lies only with the idea of a prime mover. That's it. The variation is between 100% chance 15 billion years ago and something else, 15 billion years ago, setting the same phenomena into effect.

Being that politicians are not burdened with the responsibility of creating a universe, what difference does it make on how they believe it came into existence?

What is more important is how they view their own, actual, responsibilities. We have democrats thinking that wealth can be multiplied via division... that islands will capsize if too many people are on them, that the Mars rover will be able to get a close up of the Apollo mission's landing location, that there are 57 states and that children need breathalyzers.

In comparison, I'll take a creationist over a completely brain-dead democrat any day._________________Always do the opposite of what SJWs say.

Obama played the race card. Hillary played the woman card. America played the Trump card.

Thousands of years old or billions, what does it matter? This is not a trivial point for the Christian faith. Although many Christians miss the connection at first glance, this issue is inseparably linked to the Gospel and the inerrancy of Scripture. Many Christians have thus been misled into believing that the young-Earth debate is a side issue and not relevant to everyday Christian life or the salvation message.

I realized that you can be creationist and go with string theory as well, and be satisfied that strings somehow got "created" if you want. There is no way for us to see beyond matter anyway, we may draw conclusions based on pattern recognition and probability and what not, so you might as well build your own opinion that you can live with and don't have to bother anybody else.

That being said, I am utterly convinced that established religions may have some amount of intuition, but to take them at face value and run by its operating system, and believe it that it is the TRUTH, is to miss those miniscule amounts of actual truths (glimpses) about reality (or whatever metaphysical word you use) that you can occasionally get when not trying to fill in the blanks with junk.

I'm happier living without knowing, because of the poetic chance that I might find out one day, then to live according to some dogma where life is about performing certain thought patterns and physical rituals, and suffer from cognitive dissonance every day.

See my post just above. I agree with all this, except the part about not wanting to know. I have a slightly different take on that. I want to live with an accurate appreciation for what is, and what is is not, known.

While religious fundamentalism is a problem to the extent that people with such beliefs take actions that affect others (e.g., terrorism) or influence social norms and laws (e.g., it's good to beat your wife; no abortion should ever be allowed), religion does happen to be the vessel that has captured most of humanity's social "lessons learned" over the ages. So in our rapid transition to secularism, we must be careful not to throw the baby out with the bath water. Our social norms and mores ("rules" we follow outside of the de-facto law) have been heavily guided by organized religion for millennia. Our laws do not contain everything necessary to guide behavior in a socially optimal way.

We may adopt various forms of philosophical morality, our laws may become more comprehensive (e.g., International Declaration of Human Rights) and more explicit (e.g., the growing volume of family court law), but we should be careful about viciously denigrating religion and spirituality in general, just for the sake of ridding ourselves of the detrimental aspects.

Furthermore, we should be careful about treating science like a religion. Real science acknowledges uncertainty. The dummied-down capsules fed to us throughout our education do not. I hear far too many somewhat educated, pseudo-intellectual people making dogmatic declarations based on their limited grasp of science or their sophomoric failure to recognize the real limits of our small but gradually increasing body of human understanding.

It's important to understand that you cannot be aware of what you do not know. Science is not a religion. Everything we know is probably wrong to some extent. Many things we think we know are probably so wrong they will someday be ridiculed.

This doesn't mean organized religion must be sheltered from all criticism; it means that such criticism should be as specific as possible to what is objectionable. So, while the term "creationism" may be widely used to refer to "Biblical" or "young Earth" creationism, I object to that usage, because it's not specific enough and persecutes some people for beliefs that are entirely rational.

Given the dangers of faith — and considering the accomplishments of reason and observation in the activity called science — I find it ironic that, whenever I lecture publicly, there always seems to be someone who comes forward and says, "Of course, your science is just a religion like ours. Fundamentally, science just comes down to faith, doesn't it?"

Well, science is not religion and it doesn't just come down to faith. Although it has many of religion's virtues, it has none of its vices. Science is based upon verifiable evidence. Religious faith not only lacks evidence, its independence from evidence is its pride and joy, shouted from the rooftops. Why else would Christians wax critical of doubting Thomas? The other apostles are held up to us as exemplars of virtue because faith was enough for them. Doubting Thomas, on the other hand, required evidence. Perhaps he should be the patron saint of scientists.

In other words, science is faith-free. No one that 'believes' in science has a religious faith in science. The two concepts are mutually exclusive.

He's a populist demagogue, pandering to religious fundamentalists. This kind of crap should have stopped 100 years ago.

To be fair, not all "creationists" believe thing that conflict with science, so you should use more specific terminology. Also, there are plenty of Democrats, including in Congress, whose beliefs are just as much in conflict with science.

Creanionists, or believers in the hypothesis (to be polite) of "intelligent design", believe the world was created by a supernatural entity, +/- 6000 years ago over the course of 7 days. So, unless you're using a different definition of creationist, the fundamental belief on which they base everything is in conflict with science. Alse, while it's probably true that there are Democrats that share this view/belief, the ones that like to talk about supporting and believing this nonsense seem to be overwhelmingly Republicans.

First of all, I'm an atheist. Secondly, yes, I am using a different, accurate definition. You are apparently referring to "young Earth creationists", "Biblical creationists", or "religious fundamentalists". Most people who hold some creationist belief are none of these things, but simply believe things like "the big bang itself may have been an intentional act of some intelligence beyond our current comprehension".

I share Prenj's distaste for the illogical and sometimes socially destructive dogma and mythology of most organized religions. But, the inaccurate generalizations parroted by you and mcgruff are intolerant, anti-spiritual bigotry and blind prejudice, which you have foolishly allowed yourself to be programmed with. Such views are neither rational nor scientific.

Edit: Oh, and when I say "Democrats also have beliefs that conflict with science", no, I'm not saying there are a lot of Creationists there (although I suspect there are -- in the Southern Baptists). What I'm talking about is, as studies have shown that we have discussed in here before, mind-boggling percentages of Democrats who believe in angels, who believe in ghosts, who make use of "psychics", and so on. I was also talking about Democrats in Congress who have talked about the risks of Guam being capsized or asked to visit the space capsule that was used to put men on Mars. Stupidity is not isolated to the Republican Party; there are a whole lot of staggeringly ignorant Democrats.

1. People like William Lane Craig or Matt Slick? Pseudo-scientific religious apologists, nothing more. That bolded sentence is nothing more than intelligent design, which is the scientific-sounding label put on creationism to try and pass it as real science. And, by the way, those are not most people, the pseudo-scientific creationists are the minority.

2. The day someone presents some evidence that, at least, hints at the existence of a spirit and i reject that, you can call me "anti-spiritual", until that day i'll keep referring to it as nonsense, thank you very much.

3. Like i said, there are probably a lot of Democrats who believe that nonsense, that doesn't excuse Republicans (on a science comittee, to make it worse).

He's a populist demagogue, pandering to religious fundamentalists. This kind of crap should have stopped 100 years ago.

To be fair, not all "creationists" believe thing that conflict with science, so you should use more specific terminology. Also, there are plenty of Democrats, including in Congress, whose beliefs are just as much in conflict with science.

Creanionists, or believers in the hypothesis (to be polite) of "intelligent design", believe the world was created by a supernatural entity, +/- 6000 years ago over the course of 7 days. So, unless you're using a different definition of creationist, the fundamental belief on which they base everything is in conflict with science. Alse, while it's probably true that there are Democrats that share this view/belief, the ones that like to talk about supporting and believing this nonsense seem to be overwhelmingly Republicans.

First of all, I'm an atheist. Secondly, yes, I am using a different, accurate definition. You are apparently referring to "young Earth creationists", "Biblical creationists", or "religious fundamentalists". Most people who hold some creationist belief are none of these things, but simply believe things like "the big bang itself may have been an intentional act of some intelligence beyond our current comprehension".

I share Prenj's distaste for the illogical and sometimes socially destructive dogma and mythology of most organized religions. But, the inaccurate generalizations parroted by you and mcgruff are intolerant, anti-spiritual bigotry and blind prejudice, which you have foolishly allowed yourself to be programmed with. Such views are neither rational nor scientific.

Edit: Oh, and when I say "Democrats also have beliefs that conflict with science", no, I'm not saying there are a lot of Creationists there (although I suspect there are -- in the Southern Baptists). What I'm talking about is, as studies have shown that we have discussed in here before, mind-boggling percentages of Democrats who believe in angels, who believe in ghosts, who make use of "psychics", and so on. I was also talking about Democrats in Congress who have talked about the risks of Guam being capsized or asked to visit the space capsule that was used to put men on Mars. Stupidity is not isolated to the Republican Party; there are a whole lot of staggeringly ignorant Democrats.

1. People like William Lane Craig or Matt Slick? Pseudo-scientific religious apologists, nothing more. That bolded sentence is nothing more than intelligent design, which is the scientific-sounding label put on creationism to try and pass it as real science. And, by the way, those are not most people, the pseudo-scientific creationists are the minority.

2. The day someone presents some evidence that, at least, hints at the existence of a spirit and i reject that, you can call me "anti-spiritual", until that day i'll keep referring to it as nonsense, thank you very much.

3. Like i said, there are probably a lot of Democrats who believe that nonsense, that doesn't excuse Republicans (on a science comittee, to make it worse).

I'm not interested in sharing it with a bigot. While what I described might qualify as "Intelligent Design", propagandists have generalized that too, such that most people assume to be in conflict with the theory of evolution. Nobody should be trying to pass any such thinking off as "science".

You want to talk about "evidence"? You show me evidence of the context in which the big bang occurred. Until then, I'll respect all possible rational explanations. Science is a subset of rational thought, not the end-all, be-all of human reason.

Let me make it easier for you, How about you even offer a speculative hypothesis that describes the context in which the big bang occurred. Oh, wait... that would not be "science", because you have no "evidence". Therefore, if you talk about that, you must be ridiculed, tarred and feathered!!!

Come on, let's hear it: what was the context that the big bang occurred in?

I'm not interested in sharing it with a bigot. While what I described might qualify as "Intelligent Design", propagandists have generalized that too, such that most people assume to be in conflict with the theory of evolution. Nobody should be trying to pass any such thinking off as "science".

You want to talk about "evidence"? You show me evidence of the context in which the big bang occurred. Until then, I'll respect all possible rational explanations. Science is a subset of rational thought, not the end-all, be-all of human reason.

Let me make it easier for you, How about you even offer a speculative hypothesis that describes the context in which the big bang occurred. Oh, wait... that would not be "science", because you have no "evidence". Therefore, if you talk about that, you must be ridiculed, tarred and feathered!!!

Come on, let's hear it: what was the context that the big bang occurred in?

the big bang is a model that explains a number of physical observable phenomena (i.e. hubbles law, background cosmic radiation, the ratio of hydrogen to various hydrogen isotopes). As more evidence is gathered, the theory may change or be discredited completely. However, dismissing the model without evidence to do so violates the hypothetico-deductive model._________________I call for full employment is a call for war!

Who dismissed the model? I'm just saying there is more. Everything we have ever observed has context; what was the context of the big bang?

I'm saying "what's beyond the horizon?", and you guys are saying, "the Priests say you fall off, but that's just stupid religion."

So I say, "that's not what I asked you," and you say, "I dunno; there's nothing there. We don't talk about that, because it's not scyents."

So I say, "there must be something. What about those guys who say maybe it goes down, like a hill, and the world is like a ball?", and you guys are saying, "That's stupid Priest talk! Boy are you an idiot! You shouldn't talk about it, because it's not scyents!"

Last edited by Bones McCracker on Sat Oct 06, 2012 9:22 am; edited 1 time in total